Creating the “Habit of Resiliency”

Bonnie Canal, MBCP go to expert on resilience. She is a nationally recognized leader in resilience innovations and strategies, and is the founder and Managing Partner of The Resiliency Institute, LLC (TRI).With her strategic work session with organizations and government officials, she has developed and delivered energizing programs that deliver results. She helps busy professionals prevent burn out while building a more resilience lifestyle.

As both a sales professional and leader, Bonnie has had to learn how resilience must play an active role in any professional’s life. Thus, the need to develop her “Resilience as a Habit”, “Creating a Culture of Resilience” and “Thinking Without a Box” programs.

Bonnie is a proud native of New Orleans and has experienced what she calls, “The Katrina, Rita, Ike, Gustav, and BP Oil Spill” disasters first hand. She has had to learn how being resilience leaders to increased performance, achieve stronger relationships, and build mental toughness that we all need in today’s ever increasing busy world.

Individual resilience includes nuances that readiness does not.Because I live in New Orleans, we tend to think of readiness as Hurricane Preparedness. It is during this time that we are constantly reminded of what we must do to be prepared if/when the next big one comes. So for 6 months out of the year we prepare ourselves by stocking our bottled water, canned foods and alternate lighting sources to be READY!

But what happens the rest of the year, or during the years that we don’t get a storm? This readiness slips; until it moves from our center of attention to something that we should be doing.

So I propose a new thought of readiness, as FEMA and other organizations are now focusing on moving from Readiness to Resilience. Each of us needs to create for ourselves the “Habit of Resilience”.

As we all know, habits are something that we do unconsciously. It is where our brains have the opportunity to go on “autopilot”, thus the “habit of resiliency” becomes who we are, not what we do. We need to incorporate into our daily lives certain behaviors that will eventually lead to a habit.

So what are some of the habits I have formed?

Getting to know my neighbors. In knowing my neighbors, I now have a sense of belonging to
a community of people and in case of any emergency, I can now know who is in
need of any specialized assistance.

Voting. By voting in all elections, I have a voice in my community on who and how we are governed.

Volunteering. I have found that this is a great way to actively engage others while sharing
the skill sets that I have.